


A Good Day

by rowanthestrange_yugihell



Category: Doctor Who, Doctor Who & Related Fandoms, Doctor Who (2005)
Genre: Clara Oswald's echoes, Class Issues, Gallifrey, Gallifreyans - Freeform, Other, Sentient TARDISes, Time Lords
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-11-05
Updated: 2015-11-05
Packaged: 2018-04-30 04:22:51
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,758
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5150096
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/rowanthestrange_yugihell/pseuds/rowanthestrange_yugihell
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Echo: Claroswinwald of Gallifrey</p><p>The Time Lords think they know everything about their “ships”, and yet they come to her when they won’t do what they want.<br/>How is she supposed to explain to them that the problem isn’t their ion convertor, but the way they shout all the time? That it isn’t their anchor disks grating, it’s the way their Tri-quadrant pilot touches the console? That it isn’t their navigation system misreading their location, it’s that they never take them anywhere fun? After all, it’s not a person, it’s a vehicle. It’s not got feelings, it’s not intelligent, it’s not alive. Stupid Gallifreyan chit - a TARDIS needs a connection to the Eye, replacement parts and the occasional recalibration.<br/>A TARDIS does not need love.</p><p>“There’s a lot of things you need to get across this universe. Warp drive, wormhole refractors… You know the thing you need most of all? You need a hand to hold.”</p>
            </blockquote>





	A Good Day

  


Claroswinwald likes her job. It’s intellectual, every day is a new challenge, and her “patients” as she calls them, endlessly fascinating.

What she doesn’t like is the people. A new “patient” means a new Time Lord to deal with. Pompous, patronising and, unfortunately, powerful. With a snap of their fingers she could be expelled from the workshop and out of the citadel for good, her “privilege” of being allowed to live here vanishing if she says the wrong words, uses the wrong tone, has the wrong expression. Privately she wonders why in the Suns they would even want a Lay-Gallifreyan when they train their own so thoroughly that one lifetime isn’t enough to hold their massive intellect. But she knows really, it’s because they would have to lift a finger, roll up their sleeves, get their hands dirty. The Gentry are all the same. So she gets to stand here while a moron dictates to her exactly what’s wrong with their craft that they have flown a grand total of three times.

“And this bit is important mind, my Quin-quadrant was reporting that the switches keep changing position when he goes to push them, and says that when he was on Katsianelle’s ship the engine didn’t make that infuriating bubbling sound. I am not going to be seen as having a poorer Capsule than Katsianelle for Other’s sake, she’s captaining a Type _63_! Not to mention-“

“Yes, I think I know exactly where the issue lies. Not your fault of course, simply a calibration issue, I’ll have…the Capsule sorted in no time. Two days processing of course, but you should be able to pick th- it up by the end of the Deca-cycle.” 

The Time Lord sniffs, clearly unused to interruption. She keeps the toothy grin on her face. Keep smiling, keep smiling, don’t call them a prat, the apartment’s too nice to throw away…

“Fine. If it were any older I’d just leave it here and be done.” The spiteful clunk of his shoe on the metal side panel makes her think of the sound his head would make in connection with her boot.

It’s not an unpopular opinion among Time Lords though, there are endless requests for newer models and the past ones get abandoned here. Once she was told to dispose of a previous model, who, when she checked the records, had apparently been flown _twice_. She replaced his Type code and fiddled it in the database before selling him back to the old owner for double the price. Seemed cruel to the lad really, returning to that arse, but he seemed game enough when she suggested the scam and she threw in a noise-softener of her own design so he’d get a share of the earnings.

That was what none of them understood. That their “TARDISes” were alive. Actually alive. In every sense of the word. They listened, communicated, sang and dreamt. They told stories, not just in their logs or in their parts, but from soul to soul. They played jokes, imagined and they felt things more deeply than she knew she ever would. And they were all different. Feisty, compliant, fearful, joyful, brave, lonely. Some became reflections of their Time Lords, others the opposite, and some just blissfully themselves. They might like to be piloted in a certain way, or go to particular places, or hate certain types of wood and refuse to have it on board. But nothing she had said had ever convinced a single Time Lord that their ships were truly alive, just like they were. But then she was a Lay-Gallifreyan, so her words carried little weight. They barely accepted _her_ as truly alive.

She watches the Lordling out of sight, makes an obscene gesture and pulls out a polishing cloth.

“I’m contractually obligated not to _say_ anything personal about the customers.” She emphasises the word, and as she gently rubs the scuffed panel, broadcasts clearly to them exactly what she thinks of their pilot and she hears a bubbly noise answering from within. She wasn’t actually lying to the Time Lord, she was pretty sure she knew what was going on.

She’s let in almost immediately, they’re very trusting, very young. Her hand slides across the console, smiling at the unique configuration of dials they’ve laid out. So they know that they can chose their own appearance, that’s good - some are so locked down they never even know they can. There’s a rumble, and she feels them pulling away from her.

“No, no, I love it, it’s nice to be unique, do your own thing, look however you want.” The rumble turns into an almost imperceptible pounding in the floor, as if she can feel her heartbeat in her shoes, though hers isn’t going quite as fast as that.

“Please don’t be nervous, I mean it sincerely. You can trust me. I’m not a trick, a trap, I’m just me.” She ensures her mind is fully open, hoping no-one comes in - it would be worse than being caught naked. She wasn’t taught how to do this, it was a gift and why she was so good at her job. Might not be a Time Lord but she would bet she could give one a run for their money. Not that she’d get the chance mind - the Gentry always liked to keep their so-called “secrets” to themselves.

She spends half a cycle talking with them. She always ends up feeling terrible after doing this part, a key part of treating her patients, often far older and wiser than her. Having to explain that the Time Lords think of these things as faults, even though they aren’t (and that they must hold that knowledge inside them forever - they are not broken, they are beautiful). The unique control placement is seen as un-ergonomic and different from what they’ve learned, so it’s bad. Never mind how pretty it is, how easy it is to swing from one quadrant to another, how when everything’s at it’s most stable all the needles point towards the central column. Perfect for a lone pilot, which her _betters_ think is a ridiculous notion, but she knows is the only way to truly bond and learn to work together, and most importantly, the way they like it. But then when has a Time Lord ever cared about what their “vessel” wants.

She separates her mind for a moment as the flood of injustice overcomes her, so as not to startle the little one. Sometimes she fantasises about asking one to come with her, to see the stars. She’d never live as long as a Time Lord, and certainly not as long as one of their species, but maybe they could spend that brief flicker together. They’d never have to go back to those awful people who can’t see them as something as worthwhile as they are, never be treated as disposable and replaceable, never feel alone again. She pushes her fingers against the bridge of her nose and tries to calm down. The room around her begins to change hue into blue. Other above, they’re so sensitive it frightens her.

“I’m okay, it’s alright, I was just feeling upset for a moment about how unfair all this is.” The colours begin to brighten again until they settle. “My favourite colour, how did you know? Rose-Pink, like the half-set.” A screen brings up a picture of one of the Suns drifting lazily down and she feels a hum of approval. Her chest aches. Another trick of hers, falling in love, sometimes twice a day. 

“I’m sorry. I’m so sorry.” They reply with a feeling of resilience, through the floor and up her arms, curling around her singular heart and into her mind. She feels space on her skin and time in her lungs, the sensation of jumping off the skin of the world and falling forever without ever crashing down, she sees an infinite number of planets and suns and people, she sees wonders.

Long past todays half-set she finally sets up to leave, logging out of her many systems. She knows they’ll be ok now. They have that inner fire that can’t be touched, and they’ll take that energy and fly and see and live. Bidding on the surface, but secretly indomitable, using their Time Lord to see the universe, not the other way around.

She stops by her longest resident on her way out. Originally brought in because of her apparently failing navigation system, her doors remain firmly closed to her as always. She puts her palms to them and thinks about the day, and her new love (to go with the hundreds of others). If they were Rose-Pink, then _she_ is Deep-Blue, separate, proud, old and direct. But every day she has to report in - who have you saved today? She feels a thrum under her hands, message received, you may leave. It’s the most communication she usually gets from her, but she’s inordinately fond. After all, it was her who taught her that a creature can override the machine they’re forced into - she wouldn’t open for anyone but the person she was waiting for. She taught her the true name for her kind, that no mere word could encapsulate. And she taught her the value of saving something, from the smallest to the largest, because to the universe, nothing singular is important, and yet everything is, from a leaf, to a wolf, to a hero.

She turns to see two people creeping quickly along the corridor, one tapping at her patients’ doors with their hand as they go, as if to find something specific. It can’t be him, can it? She knows him by reputation alone, hears them joke that he’s a changeling, an oddity, not like a _real_ Time Lord at all. She feels a rush of energy like a hitch of breath against her fingers and she steps back and away, into the shadows. The two pause by a recent model who has intimated to her that they would sooner be dropped in the pit than leave the ground again, but they’re used to bending to the will of Time Lords and so their doors automatically open, the smaller one slipping inside. She shouldn’t say anything, could lose her job. But it’s a good day and her longest patient needs her. It’s a good day and she won’t just be some Gallifreyan staying stock still, she has to try. Oh, please, please, let it be a _good day_.

She steps forward.

  



End file.
